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LOVE POEMS 



FROM THE WORKS OF 



ROBERT BROWNING 



ELIZABETH BARRETT BROWNING 



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THE CONTENTS 

Dramatic Lyrics 

In a Year Robert Browning 

The Lady's "Yes" Mrs. Browning 

Dramatic Lyrics 

Life in a Love Robert Browning 

A Man's Requirements Mrs. Browning 

That Day Mrs. Browning 

Asolando: Fancies and Facts 

Summum Bonum Robert Browning 

Dramatic Lyrics 

Song Robert Browning 

The Two Poets of Croisic (Selection) Robert Browning 

Last Poems 

My Heart and I Mrs. Browning 

Change Upon Change Mrs. Browning 

Love Mrs. Browning 

Dramatis Personae 

A Face Robert Browning 

Life and Love Mrs. Browning 

A Woman's Shortcomings Mrs. Browning 

Dramatic Romances 

In a Gondola Robert Browning 

Dramatic Lyrics 

The Lost Mistress Robert Browning 

Dramatic Lyrics 

Love Among the Ruins Robert Browning 

A Denial Mrs. Browning 

Ferishtah's Fancies (Selection) Robert Browning 

Dramatis Personae 

James Lee's Wife — ^IV. Along the Beach. Robert Browning 
Dramatic Lyrics 

Women and Roses Robert Browning 

Dramatic Lyrics 

A False Step Mrs. Browning 

Insufficiency Mrs. Browning 

Inclusions Mrs. Browning 

The Romance of the Swan's Nest Mrs. Browning 



13 
17 

19 
21 
23 

25 

27 
29 

30 
32 
33 

35 

37 
38 

41 

43 

45 
49 
53 

54 

57 



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THE CONTENTS— Continued 

Ferishtah's Fancies (Selection) Robert Browning 71 

La Saisiaz (Selection) Robert Browning 73 

Dramatic Lyrics 

A Woman's Last Word Robert Browning 74 

Pacchiarotto 

Prologue Robert Browning 77 

Dramatic Lyrics 

One Way of Love Robert Browning 79 

Dramatic Lyrics 

Garden Fancies — I. The Flower's Name. Robert Browning 81 

May's Love Mrs. Browning 83 

Dramatic Lyrics 

Meeting at Night Robert Browning 85 

Dramatic Lyrics 

In Three Days Robert Browning 87 

Proof and Disproof Mrs. Browning 89 

Dramatic Lyrics 

Any Wife to Any Husband Robert Browning 91 

Question and Answer Mrs. Browning 97 

Pippa Passes 

Noon Robert Browning 99 

Dramatis Personae 

Eurydice to Orpheus Robert Browning 101 

Dramatic Lyrics 

Misconceptions Robert Browning 103 

Dramatis Personae 

James Lee's Wife — I. James Lee's Wife 

Speaks at the Window Robert Browning 105 

Dramatic Lyrics 

A Pretty Woman Robert Browning 107 

The Best Thing in the World Mrs. Browning 1 1 1 

Magical Nature Robert Browning 1 13 

Amy's Cruelty Mrs. Browning 1 1 5 

Dramatic Lyrics 

Parting at Morning Robert Browning 1 19 

My Kate Mrs. Browning 121 

Loved Once Mrs. Browning 1 23 

Asolando: Fancies and Facts 

Poetics Robert Browning 127 

8 

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ILLUSTRATIONS 

Robert Browning Frontispiece 

Love Chilled Jean Aubert 12 

Declaration of Love F. Soulacroix 16 

Angioline F. von Blaas 20 

Importunate Troubadour F. Andreotti 24 

Innocence J- B. Greuze 26 

Wild Rose Otto Lingner 28 

Youth J. F. Ballavoine 34 



Life and Love G. F. Watts 

Canal of the Cindecca, Venice W. C. Stanfield . . . 

Love Among the Ruin? Sir E. Burne- Jones 

Young Love R. Collin 

Rose Maiden Paul Thumann . . . 

Fare Thee Well Hermann Koch . . . 

First V/hisper of Love L. Alma-Tadema. . 

Rustic Simplicity J. Comerra-Paton. . 

Sweet Silence J. Haynes Williams 

Love Thirsty Jean Aubert 



36 
40 
44 
52 
56 
60 
62 
64 
70 
72 

Remember Me C. Froschl 76 

Fond Recollections E. Niczky 80 

Landscape. Claude Monet 84 

Violante • Palma Vecchio 86 

Corn Flowers Paul Thumann 98 

Orpheus and Eurydice Sir F. Leighton 1 00 

A Haymaker F. N. A. Feyen-Perrin 102 

Teacher and Pupil Oskar Begas 104 

Lydia N. Sichel 106 

Binding on the Roses Jules Salles 112 

Expectation Jan Van Beers 114 

Repose of Spring H. Knochl 118 

Spring Dreams Otto Lingner 120 

A Lover's Birthday Gift F. Soulacroix 126 




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IN A YEAR 
I. 

VFEVER any more, 

-■■^ While I live, 

Need I hope to see his face 

As before. 
Once his love grown chill, 

Mine may strive: 
Bitterly we re-embrace, 

Single still. 

II. 
Was it something said, 

Something done, 
Vexed him ? was it touch of hand, 

Turn of head ? 
Strange ! that very way 

Love begun : 
I as little understand 

Love's decay. 

III. 
When I sewed or drew, 

I recall 
How he looked as if I sung, 

— Sweetly too. 
If I spoke a word. 

First of all 
Up his cheek the color sprung, 

Then he heard. 



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IV. 
Sitting by my side, 

At my feet, 
So he breathed but air I breathed, 

Satisfied ! 
I, too, at love's brim 

Touched the sweet : 
I would die if death bequeathed 

Sweet to him. 

V. 

"Speak, I love thee best!" 

He exclaimed : 
"Let thy love my own foretell ! " 

I confessed : 
"Clasp my heart on thine 

"Now unblamed, 
"Since upon thy soul as well 

"Hangeth mine!" 

VI. 
Was it wrong to own, 

Being truth ? 
Why should all the giving prove 

His alone ? 
I had wealth and ease. 

Beauty, youth : 
Since my lover gave me love, 

I gave these. 

VII. 
That was all I meant, 

— To be just, 
And the passion I had raised, 

To content. 



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Since he chose to change 

Gold for dust. 
If I gave him what he praised 

Was it strange ? 

VIII. 
Would he loved me yet, 

On and on, 
While I found some way undreamed 

— Paid my debt ! 
Gave more life and more, 

Till, all gone. 
He should smile "She never seemed 

"Mine before. 

IX. 
"What, she felt the while, 

"Must I think? 
" Love's so different with us men ! " 

He should smile: 
"Dying for my sake — ' 

"White and pink! 
"Can't we touch these bubbles then 

"But they break? " 

X. 

Dear, the pang is brief, 

Do thy part. 
Have thy pleasure! How perplexed 

Grows belief ! 
Well, this cold clay clod 

Was man's heart : 
Crumble it, and what comes next ? 

Is it God ? —%ohert (Browning 




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Yes, ' I answered you last night; 
' No, ' this morning, sir, I say. 



LOVE POEMS 



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Cfje notify **ges;" 
I. 

VES, " I answered you last night ; 
" No," this morning, sir, I say : 
Colors seen by candle-light 
Will not look the same by day. 

II. 

When the viols played their best. 
Lamps above and laughs below. 

Love me sounded like a jest. 
Fit for yes or fit for no. 

III. 

Call me false or call me free, 
Vow, whatever light may shine, - 

Xo man on your face shall see 
Any grief for chcinge on mine. 

IV. 

Yet the sin is on us both ; 

Time to dance is not to woo ; 
\\ ooing light makes fickle troth, 

Scorn oi me recoils on you. 

V. 

Leara to win a lady's faith 
Xobly, as the thing is high, 

Bravely, as for life and death, 
With a loyal gravity. 










1 8 LOF£ POEMS 


VI. 




Lead her from the festive boards, 

Point her to the starry skies ; 
Guard her, by your truthful words, 


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Pure from courtship's flatteries. 

VII. 

By your truth she shall be true. 
Ever true, as wives of yore ; 


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Shall be Yes forevermore. 

— Elizabeth ^arrett frowning 


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LIFE IN A LOVE 

PSCAPE me? 

Never — 
Beloved ! 
While I am I, and you are you. 

So long as the world contains us both, 

Me the loving and you the loth, 
While the one eludes, must the other pursue, 
My life is a fault at last, I fear: 

It seems too much like a fate, indeed ! 

Though I do my best I shall scarce succeed. 
But what if I fail of my purpose here? 
It is but to keep the nerves at strain, 

To dry one's eyes and laugh at a fall, 
And, baffled, get up and begin again, — 

So the chace takes up one's life, that's all. 
While, look but once from your farthest bound 

At me so deep in the dust and dark. 
No sooner the old hope goes to ground 

Than a new one, straight to the self-same mark, 
I shape me — 
Ever 
Removed ! 

— Robert frowning 



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' ' Love me with thine open youth 
In its frank surrender. 



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I. 

T OVE me, Sweet, with all thou art, 

Feeling, thinking, seeing ; 
Love me in the lightest part, 
Love me in full being. 

II. 
Love me with thine open youth 

In its frank surrender ; 
With the vowing of thy mouth, 

With its silence tender. 

III. 

Love me with thine azure eyes. 
Made for earnest granting ; 

Taking color from the skies, 

Can Heaven's truth be wanting ? 

IV. 
Love me with their lids, that fall 

Snow-like at first meeting ; 
Love me with thine heart, that all 

Neighbors then see beating. 

V. 
Love me with thine hand stretched out 

Freely — open-minded : 
Love me with thy loitering foot, — 

Hearing one behind it. 




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VI. 
Love me with thy voice, that turns 

Sudden faint above me ; 
Love me with thy blush that burns 

When I murmur Love me ! 

VII. 
Love me with thy thinking soul, 

Break it to love-sighing ; 
Love me with thy thoughts that roll 

On through living — dying. 

VIII. 
Love me in thy gorgeous airs, 

When the world has crov^ed thee ; 
Love me, kneeling at thy prayers, 

With the angels round thee. 

IX. 
Love me pure, as musers do, 

Up the woodlands shady: 
Love me gayly, fast and true. 

As a winsome lady. 

X. 

Through all hopes that keep us brave, 

Farther off or nigher. 
Love me for the house and grave, 

And for something higher. 
XI. 
Thus, if thou wilt prove me. Dear, 

Woman's love no fable, 

I will love thee — half a year — 

As a man is able. 

— Elizabeth ^arrett frowning 






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T STAND by the river where both of us stood, 

And there is but one shadow to darken the flood ; 
And the path leading to it, where both used to pass, 
Has the step of but one, to take dew from the grass, — 

One forlorn since that dav 



II. 

The flowers of the margin are many to see ; 
None stoops at my biddmg to pluck them for me. 
The bird in the alder sings loudly and long, — 
My low sound of weeping disturbs not his song. 

As thy vow did, that day. 

III. 
I stand by the river, I think of the vow; 
Oh, calm as the place is, vow-breaker, be thou ! 
I leave the flower growing, the bird unreproved ; 
Would I trouble thee rather than them, my beloved, — 

And riy lover that day } 

IV. 

Go, be sure of my love, by that tree son forgiven ; 

Of my prayers, by the blessings they win thee from 

Heaven ; 
Of my grief— (guess the length of the sword by the 

sheath's) 
By the silence of life, more pathetic than death's ! 

Go, — be clear of that day ! 
— Elizabeth ^arrett frowning 



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SUMMUM BONUM 

A LL the breath and the bloom of the year in the bag 
of one bee : 
All the wonder and wealth of the mine in 
the heart of one gem : 
In the core of one pearl all the shade and the shine 
of the sea : 
Breath and bloom, shade and shine, — wonder, 
wealth, and — how far above them — 
Truth, that's brighter than gem, 
Trust, that's purer than pearl, — 
Brightest truth, purest trust in the universe — all were 
for me 

In the kiss of one girl. 

— Robert frowning 



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SONG 
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VTAY but you, who do not love her, 
Is she not pure gold, my mistress ? 
Holds earth aught — speak truth — above her ? 

Aught like this tress, see, and this tress. 
And this last fairest tress of all, 
So fair, see, ere I let it fall > 

II. 
Because, you spend your lives in praising ; 

To praise, you search the wide world over : 
Then why not witness, calmly gazing, 

If earth holds aught — speak truth — above her ? 
Above this tress, and this, I touch 
But cannot praise, I love so much ! 

— Tiflbert frowning 




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That was thy face I ' ' 



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MY HEART AND I 
I. 

pNOUGH! we're tired, my heart and L 
We sit beside the headstone thus, 
And wish that name were carved for us. 

The moss reprints more tenderly 

The hard types of the mason's knife. 
As heaven's sweet Kfe renews earth's Ufe 

V/ith which we're tired, my heart and I. 
II. 

You see we're tired, my heart and I. 
We dealt with books, we trusted men, 
And in our owti blood drenched the pen, 

As if such colors could not fly. 

We walked too straight for fortune's end. 
We loved too true to keep a friend ; 

At last we're tired, my heart and I. 
III. 

How tired we feel, my heart and I ! 
We seem of no use in the world ; 
Our fancies hang gray and uncurled 

About men's eyes indifferently ; 

Our voice which thrilled you so, v^ll let 
You sleep ; our tears are only wet : 

What do we here, my heart and I } 
IV. 

So tired, so tired, my heart and I ! 
It was not thus in that old time 
When Ralph sat with me 'neath the lime 

To watch the sunset from the sky. 



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"Dear love, you're looking tired," he said; 
I, smiling at him, shook my head : 
'Tis now we're tired, my heart and I. 

V. 

So tired, so tired, my heart and I ! 

Though now none takes me on his arm 
To fold me close and kiss me warm 

Till each quick breath end in a sigh 
Of happy languor. Now, alone. 
We lean upon this graveyard stone, 

Uncheered, unkissed, my heart and I. 

VI. 

Tired out we are, my heart and I. 
Suppose the world brought diadems 
To tempt us, crusted with loose gems 

Of powers and pleasures? Let it try. 
We scarcely care to look at even 
A pretty child, or God's blue heaven. 

We feel so tired, my heart and I. 

VII. 
Yet who complains? My heart and I ? 
In this abundant earth no doubt 
Is little room for things worn out : 
Disdain them, break them, throw them by ! 
And if before the days grew rough 
We once were loved, used, — well enough, 
I think, we've fared, my heart and I. 

— Elizabeth ^arrett frowning 




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Cijange Mpon Cfjange 
I. 

pIVE months ago the stream did flow, 

The HKes bloomed within the sedge, 
And we were Hngering to and fro. 
Where none will track thee in this snow, 

Along the stream, beside the hedge. 
Ah, Sweet, be free to love and go ! 

For if I do not hear thy foot, 
Tlie frozen river is as mute. 

The flowers have dried down to the root : 
And why, since these be changed since May, 

Shouldst thou change less than they ? 

II. 
And slow, slow as the winter snow 

The tears have drifted to mine eyes; 
And my poor cheeks, five months ago 
Set blushing at thy praises so. 

Put paleness on for a disguise. 
Ah, Sweet, be free to praise and go ! 

For if my face is turned too pale. 

It was thine oath that first did fail,— 
It was thy love proved false and frail, — 
And why, since these be changed enow, 

Should / change less than thou ? 

— Elizabeth ^arrett frowning 



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Hobe 

\17E cannot live, except thus mutually 
We alternate, aware or unaware, 
The reflex act of life: and when we bear 
Our virtue outward most impulsively, 
Most full of invocation, and to be 
Most instantly compellant, certes there 
We live most life, whoever breathes most air 
And counts his dying years by sun and sea. 
But when a soul, by choice and conscience, doth 
Throw out her full force on another soul. 
The conscience and the concentration both 
Make mere life, Love. For Life in perfect whole 
And aim consummated, is Love in sooth, 
As Nature's magnet-heat rounds pole with pole. 
— Elizabeth ^arrett frowning 



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Youth 



J. F. Ballavoine 
If one could have that little head of hers 
Painted upon a background of pale gold. " 

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Jfrom Bramatis; ^er^onae 

A FACE 

T F one could have that Kttle head of hers 

Painted upon a background of pale gold, 

Such as the Tuscan's early art prefers ! 

No shade encroaching on the matchless mold 

Of those two lips, which should be opening soft 
In the pure profile ; not as when she laughs, 

For that spoils all: but rather as if aloft 

Yon hyacinth, she loves so, leaned its staff's 

Burthen of honey-colored buds to kiss 

And capture 'twixt the lips apart for this. 

Then her lithe neck, three fingers might surround, 

How it should waver on the pale gold ground 

Up to the fruit-shaped, perfect chin it lifts ! 

I know, Correggio loves to mass, in rifts 

Of heaven, his angel faces, orb on orb 

Breaking its outline, burning shades absorb: 

But these are only massed there, I should think. 
Waiting to see some wonder momently 
Grow out, stand full, fade slow against the sky 
(That's the pale ground you'd see this sweet face by), 
All heaven, meanwhile, condensed into one eye 

Which fears to lose the wonder, should it wink. 

— Robert frowning 






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"So, when Life looked upward, being 
Warmed and breathed on from above. 



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37 






ILiit anb Hobe 

I. 

pAST this Life of mine was dying, 

Blind already and calm as death, 
Snowflakes on her bosom lying 
Scarcely heaving with her breath. 



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Love came by, and having known her 

In a dream of fabled lands, 
Gently stooped, and laid upon her 

Mystic chrism of holy hands ; 

III. 
Drew his smile across her folded 

Eyelids, as the swallow dips ; 
Breathed as finely as the cold did 

Through the locking of her lips. 

IV. 
So, when Life looked upward, being 

Warmed and breathed on from above, 
What sight could she have for seeing. 
Evermore . . . but only LOVE ? 

— Elizabeth ^arrett frowning 



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I. 

CHE has laughed as softly as if she sighed, 

She has counted six, and over. 
Of a purse well filled and a heart well tried- 

Oh, each a worthy lover ! 
They "give her time ;" for her soul must slip 

Where the world has set the grooving ; 
She will lie to none with her fair red lip : 

But love seeks truer loving. 



She trembles her fan in a sweetness dumb, 

As her thoughts were beyond recalling, 
With a glance for one, and a glance for some. 

From her eyelids rising and falling ; 
Speaks common words with a blushful air, 

Hears bold words, unreproving ; 
But her silence says — what she never will swear- 

And love seeks better loving. 

III. 
Go, lady, lean to the night-guitar 

And drop a smile to the bringer ; 
Then smile as sweetly when he is far, 

At the voice of an in-door singer. 
Bask tenderly beneath tender eyes ; 

Glance lightly, on their removing ; 
And join new vows to old perjuries — 

But dare not call it loving. 






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LOF£ POEMS 



39 



IV. 

Unless you can think, when the song is done, 

No other is soft in the rhythm ; 
Unless you can feel, when left by One, 

That all men else go with him ; 
Unless you can know, when unpraised by his breath, 

That your beauty itself wants proving ; 
Unless you can swear " For life, for death ! " — 



Oh, fear to call it loving ! 



Unless you can muse in a crowd all day 
On the absent face that fixed you ; 

Unless you can love, as the angels may, 
With the breadth of heaven betwixt you ; 

Unless you can dream that his faith is fast, 
Through behoving and unbehoving ; 

Unless you can die when the dream is past— 
loving " 



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41 



jFrom 3!Bramatic d^omantt^ 

IN A GONDOLA 

f/e Sings 
I. 

pAST we glide, and past, and past ! 

What's that poor Agnese doing 
Where they make the shutters fast ? 

Gray Zanobi's just a-wooing 
To his couch the purchased bride : 

Past we gUde ! 






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II. 

Past we ghde, and past, and past ! 

Why's the Pucci Palace flaring 
Like a beacon to the blast ? 

Guests by hundreds, not one caring 
If the dear host's neck were wried : 



Past 



we gli 



de! 



She Sings 
I. 

The moth's kiss, first ! 

Kiss me as if you made believe 

You were not sure, this eve 

How my face, your flower, had pursed 

Its petals up ; so, here and there 

You brush it, till I grow aware 

Who wants me, and wide ope I burst. 






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LOVE POEMS 




II. 

The bee's kiss, now ! 
Kiss me as if you entered gay 
My heart at some noonday, 
A bud that dares not disallow 
Tlie claim, so all is rendered up. 
And passively its shattered cup 
Over your head to sleep I bow. 

— Robert frowning 









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43 



Jf rom dramatic ICpricg 

THE LOST MISTRESS 
I. 

A LL'S over, then : does truth sound bitter 
As one at first beheves ? 
Hark, 'tis the sparrows' good-night twitter 
About your cottage eaves! 



And the leaf-buds on the vine are woolly, 

I noticed that, to-day ; 
One day more bursts them open fully 

— You know the red turns gray. 

III. 
To-morrow we meet the same then, dearest ? 

May I take your hand in mine ? 
Mere friends are we — well, friends the merest 

Keep much that I resign : 

IV. 

For each glance of the eye so bright and black, 
Though I keep with heart's endeavor, — 

Your voice, when you wish the snowdrops back. 
Though it stay in my soul for ever ! — 

V. 

Yet I will but say what mere friends say. 

Or only a thought stronger; 
I will hold your hand but as long as all may. 

Or so very little longer! 

— I^obert frowning 



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LOVE POEMS 45 


Jf rom dramatic H^tit^ 


LOVE AMONG THE RUINS 
I 




1. 

"V17HERE the quiet-colored end of evening smiles, 
Miles and miles 


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On the solitary pastures where our sheep 




Half-asleep 


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Tinkle homeward thro' the twilight, stray or stop 




As they crop — 




Was the site once of a city great and gay, 




(So they say) 




Of our country's very capital, its prince 




Ages since 




Held his court in, gathered councils, wielding far 




Peace or war. 




11. 


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To distinguish slopes of verdure, certain rills 


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From the hills 




Intersect and give a name to, (else they run 




Into one) 




Where the domed and daring palace shot its spires 


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Up like fires 


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O'er the hundred-gated circuit of a wall 


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Bounding all. 




Made of marble, men might march on nor be pressed, 




Twelve abreast. 


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LOVE POEMS 



III. 

And such plenty and perfection, see, of grass 

Never was ! 
Such a carpet as, this summer-time, o'erspreads 

And embeds 
Every vestige of the city, guessed alone, 

Stock or stone — 
Where a multitude of men breathed joy and woe 

Long ago; 
I jj^^.^ Lust of glory pricked their hearts up, dread of shame 
' Struck them tame ; 

And that glory and that shame alike, the gold 

Bought and sold. 







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IV. 

Now, — the single little turret that remains 

On the plains. 
By the caper overrooted, by the gourd 

Overscored, 
While the patching houseleek's head of blossom winkj 

Through the chinks — 
Marks the basement whence a tower in ancient time 

Sprang sublime, 
And a burning ring, all round, the chariots traced 

As they raced, 
And the monarch and his minions and his dames 

Viewed the games. 



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47 



And I know, while thus the quiet-colored eve 

Smiles to leave 
To their folding, all our many-tinkling fleece 

In such peace, 
And the slopes and rills in undistinguished gray 

Melt away — 
That a girl with eager eyes and yellow hair 

Waits me there 
In the turret whence the charioteers caught soul 

For the goal. 
When the king looked, where she looks now, breathless, 
dumb 

Till I come. 

VI. 

But he looked upon the city, every side. 

Far and wide, 
All the mountains topped with temples, all the glades, 

Colonnades, 
All the causeys, bridges, aqueducts, — and then, 

All the men ! 
When I do come, she will speak not, she will stand, 

Either hand 
On my shoulder, give her eyes the first embrace 

Of my face. 
Ere we rush, ere we extinguish sight and speech 

Each on each. 



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48 LOF£ POEMS 

VII. 

In one year they sent a million fighters forth 

South and North, 
And they built their gods a brazen pillar high 

As the sky, 
Yet reserved a thousand chariots in full force — 

Gold, of course. 
Oh heart ! oh blood that freezes, blood that burns ! 

Earth's returns 
For whole centuries of folly, noise and sin ! 

Shut them in. 
With their triumphs and their glories and the rest ! 

Love is best. 

— Robert frowning 



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49 



^ Benial 



I. 



\\7E have met late — it is too late to meet, 

O friend, not more than friend ! 
Death's forecome shroud is tangled round my feet, 
And if I step or stir, I touch the end. 

In this last jeopardy 
Can I approach thee, I, who cannot move? 
How shall I answer thy request for love? 

Look in my face and see. 

II. 
I love thee not, I dare not love thee ! go 

In silence; drop my hand. 
If thou seek roses, seek them where they blow 
In garden-alleys, not in desert-sand. 

Can life and death agree, 
That thou shouldst stoop thy song to my complaint? 
I cannot love thee. If the word is faint, 

Look in my face and see. 

in. 

I might have loved thee in some former days. 

Oh, then, my spirits had leapt 
As now they sink, at hearing thy love-praise ! 
Before these faded cheeks were overwept. 

Had this been asked ot me. 
To love thee with my whole strong heart and head, — 
I should have said still . . . yes, but smiled and said, 

"Look in my face and see!" 









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IV. 

But now . . . God sees me, God, who took my 
heart 

And drowned it in Hfe's surge. 
In all your wide warm earth I have no part — 
A light song overcomes me like a dirge, 

Could Love's great harmony 
The saints keep step to when their bonds are loose, 
Not weigh me down? am / a wife to choose? 

Look in my face and see — 

V. 

While I behold, as plain as one who dreams. 

Some woman of full worth. 
Whose voice, as cadenced as a silver stream's, 
Shall prove the fountain-soul which sends it forth; 

One younger, more thought-free 
And fair and gay, than I, thou must forget. 
With brighter eyes than these . . . which are not 
wet . . . 

Look in my face and see! 

VI. 

So farewell thou, whom I have known too late 

To let thee come so near. 
Be counted happy while men call thee great, 
And one beloved woman feels thee dear! — 

Not I !— that cannot be. 
I am lost, I am changed, — I must go farther, where 
The change shall take me worse, and no one dare 

Look in my face and see. 






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LOVE POEMS 



VII. 

Meantime I bless thee. By these thoughts of mine 

I bless thee from all such ! 
I bless thy lamp to oil, thy cup to wine, 
Thy hearth to joy, thy hand to an equal touch 

Of loyal troth. For me, 
I love thee not, I love thee not ! — away ! 
Here's no more courage in m.y soul to say, 

"Look in my face and see." 

— Elizabeth Barrett frowning 






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LOVE POEMS 



53 



Jfrom Jferis;f)taf)'s; jfancies; 



SELECTION 



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OUND us the wild creatures, overhead the trees, 
Underfoot the moss-tracks, — life and love with 



th 



ese! 



I to wear a fawn-skin, thou to dress in flowers : 
All the long lone Summer-day, that greenwood life of 
ours! 

Rich-pavilioned, rather, — still the world without, — 
Inside — gold-roofed, silk-walled silence round about ! 
Queen it thou on purple, — I, at watch and ward 
Couched beneath the columns, gaze, thy slave, love's 
guard 1 

So, for us no world ? Let throngs press thee to me ! 
Up and down amid men, heart by heart fare we ! 
Welcome squalid vesture, harsh voice, hateful face ! 
God is soul, souls I and thou: with souls should souls 
have place. 

— Robert frowning 



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JAMES LEE'S WIFE 


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IV — Along the Beach 

IV. 


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You were just weak earth, I knew : 


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With much in you waste, with many a weed. 


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And plenty of passions run to seed, 


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But a htde good grain too. 


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And such as you were, I took you for mine : 

Did not you find me yours. 
To watch the oHve and wait the vine, 
And wonder when rivers of oil and wine 

Would flow, as the Book assures ? 

VI. 
Well, and if none of these good things came. 

What did the failure prove ? 
The man was my whole world, all the same, 
With his flowers to praise or his weeds to blame. 

And, either or both, to love. 

VII. 
Yet this turns now to a fault — there! there ! 

That I do love, watch too long, 
And wait too well, and weary and wear; 
And 'tis all an old story, and my despair 

Fit subject for some new song : 



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LOVE POEMS 



55 



VIII. 
"How the light, Hght love, he has wings to fly 

"At suspicion of a bond: 
"My wisdom has bidden your pleasure good-bye, 
"Which will turn up next in a laughing eye, 

"And why should you look beyond?" 

— Robert frowning 






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Rose Maiden 



Paul Thumann 



'Dear rose without a thorn. " 



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LOVE POEMS 



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jf rom dramatic Upvitsi 

WOMEN AND ROSES 
I. 

T DREAM of a red-rose tree. 

And which of its roses three 
Is the dearest rose to me } 



Round and round, Uke a dance of snow 
In a dazzhng drift, as its guardians, go 
Floating the women faded for ages, 
Sculptured in stone, on the poet's pages. 
Then follow women fresh and gay, 
Living and loving and loved to-day. 
Last, in the rear, flee the multitude of maidens. 
Beauties yet unborn. And all, to one cadence, 
They circle their rose on my rose tree. 

III. 
Dear rose, thy term is reached, 
TTiy leaf hangs loose and bleached: 
Beec pass it unimpeached. 

IV. 
Stay then, stoop, since I cannot climb, 
You, great shapes of the antique time! 
How shall I fix you, fire you, freeze you, 
Break my heart at your feet to please you ? 
Oh, to possess and be possessed! 
Hearts that beat 'neath each pallid breast ! 
Once but of love, the poesy, the passion. 
Drink but once and die! — In vain, the same fashion, 
They circle their rose on my rose tree. 





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LOF£ POEMS 



Dear rose, thy joy's undimmed, 

Thy cup is ruby-rimmed, 

Thy cup's heart nectar-brimmed. 






VI. 

Deep, as drops from a statue's pHnth 
The bee sucked in by the hyacinth; 
So will I bury me while burning. 
Quench like him at a plunge my yearning, 
Eyes in your eyes, lips on your lips ! 
Fold me fast where the cincture slips. 
Prison all my soul in eternities of pleasure. 
Girdle me for once! But no — the old measure, 
Tliey circle their rose on my rose tree. 

VII. 
Dear rose without a thorn, 
Thy bud's the babe unborn: 
First streak of a new morn. 

VIII. 
Wings, lend wings for the cold, the clear! 
What is far conquers what is near. 
Roses will bloom nor want beholders. 
Sprung from the dust where our flesh moulders. 
What shall arrive with the cycle's change } 
A novel grace and a beauty strange. 
I will make an Eve, be the artist that began her, 
Shaped her to his mind! — Alas! in like manner 
They circle their rose on my rose tree. 

— Tlobert frowning 



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59 









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jf rom dramatic ilprics; 

A FALSE STEP 
I. 

C! WEET, thou hast trod on a heart. 

Pass ; there's a world full of men ; 
And women as fair as thou art 

Must do such things now and then. 

II. 
Thou only hast stepped unaware,— 

Malice, not one can impute ; 
And why should a heart have been there 

In the way of a fair woman's foot ? 

III. 
It was not a stone that could trip. 

Nor was it a thorn that could rend : 
Put up thy proud under-lip ! 

'Twas merely the heart of a friend. 
IV. 
And yet peradventure one day 

Thou, sitting alone at the glass. 
Remarking the bloom gone away, 

Where the smile in its dimplement was, 

V. 
And seeking around thee in vain 

From hundreds who flattered before, 

Such a word as "Oh, not in the main 

Do I hold thee less precious, but more! " . . 

VI. 
Thou'lt sigh, very like, on thy part, 

"Of all I have known or can know, 
I wish I had only that Heart 

I trod upon ages ago ! " 

— Elizabeth garret t frowning 






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I. 

'^HERE is no one beside thee and no one above thee, 
Thou standest alone as the nightingale sings ! 
And my words that would praise thee are impotent 

things, 
For none can express thee though all should approve 

thee. 
I love thee so. Dear, that I only ca:n love thee. 

II. 
Say, what can I do for thee ? weary thee, grieve 

thee? 
Lean on thy shoulder, new burdens to add ? 
Weep my tears over thee, making thee sad } 
Oh, hold me not — love me not ! let me retrieve thee. 
I love thee so. Dear, that I only can leave thee. 

— Elizabeth ^arrett frowning 



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First Whisper of Love L. Alma-Tade.ma 

"Nor hands nor cheeks k.eep separate, 
When soul is jo ined to soul. 



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LOVE POEMS 



63 









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I. 

/^H, wilt thou have my hand, Dear, to He along in 

thine ? 
As a little stone in a running stream, it seems to lie and 

pine. 
Now drop the poor pale hand. Dear, unfit to plight with 

thine. 

II. 
Oh, wilt thou have my cheek. Dear, drawn closer to 

thine own ? 
My cheek is white, my cheek is worn, by many a tear 

run down. 
Now leave a little space. Dear, lest it should wet thine 

own. 

III. 
Oh, must thou have my soul, Dear, commingled with 

thy soul ? — 
Red grows the cheek, and warm the hand; the part is in 

the whole : 
Nor hands nor cheeks keep separate, when soul is 
joined to soul. 

— Elizabeth ^arrett frowning 




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65 



tlTije i^omance of tije ^toan'sf J^esit 



'So the dreams depart, 
So the fading phantoms flee, 
And the sharp reahty 
Now must act its part." 

— Westwood's Beads from a Rosary. 



I. 

T ITTLE Ellie sits alone 

'Mid the beeches of a meadow, 
By a stream-side on the grass, 
And the trees are showering down 
Doubles of their leaves in shadow 
On her shining hair and face. 



II. 
She has thrown her bonnet by, 
And her feet she has been dipping 
In the shallow water's flow : 
Now she holds them nakedly 

In her hands, all sleek and dripping, 
While she rocketh to and fro. 



III. 
Little Ellie sits alone, 
And the smile she softly uses 
Fills the silence like a speech. 
While she thinks what shall be done. 
And the sweetest pleasure chooses 
For her future within reach. 




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66 



LOVE POEMS 



IV. 

Little Ellie in her smile 

Chooses — "I will have a lover 
Riding on a steed of steeds : 
He shall love me without guile, 
And to him I will discover 

The swan's nest among the reeds 



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V. 
"And the steed shall be red-roan, 
And the lover shall be noble. 

With an eye that takes the breath : 
And the lute he plays upon 
Shall strike ladies into trouble, 
As his sword strikes men to death. 

VI. 
"And the steed it shall be shod 
All in silver, housed in azure. 

And the mane shall swim the wind ; 
And the hoofs along the sod 

Shall flash onward and keep measure. 
Till the shepherds look behind. 

VII. 
"But my lover will not prize 
All the glory that he rides in. 
When he gazes in my face: 
He will say, *0 Love, thine eyes 
Build the shrine my soul abides in 
And I kneel here for thy grace ! ' 



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67 



VIII. 
"TTien, ay, then he shall kneel low, 
With the red-roan steed anear him 
Which shall seem to understand. 
Till I answer, 'Rise and go! 

For the world must love and fear him. 
Whom I gift with heart and hand.' 

IX. 
"Then he will arise so pale, 
I shall feel my own lips tremble 
With a yes I must not say, 
Nathless maiden-brave, 'Farewell,' 
I will utter, and dissemble — 

' Light to-morrow with to-day ! ' 

X. 

"Then he'll ride among the hills 
To the wide world past the river, 
There to put away all wrong ; 
To make straight distorted wills, 
And to empty the broad quiver 
Which the wicked bear along. 

XI. 
"Three times shall a young foot-page 
Swim the stream and climb the mountain 
And kneel down beside my feet — 
'Lo, my master sends this gage. 
Lady, for thy pity's counting ! 
What wilt thou exchange for it ? 



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LOVE POEMS 



XII. 
"And the first time I will send 
A white rosebud for a guerdon, 
And the second time, a glove ; 
But the third time — I may bend 

From my pride, and answer — 'Pardon 
If he comes to take my love.' 

XIII. 
"Then the young foot-page will run, 
Then my lover will ride faster, 
Till he kneeleth at my knee : 
'I am a duke's eldest son, 

Thousand serfs do call me master. 
But, O Love, I love but thee/ 

XIV. 
"He will kiss me on the mouth 
Then, and lead me as a lover 
Through the crowds that praise his deeds ; 
And, when soul-tied by one troth, 
Unto him I will discover 

That swan's nest among the reeds." 

XV. 
Little Ellie, with her smile 
Not yet ended, rose up gayly, 

Tied the bonnet, donned the shoe, 
And went homeward, round a mile, 
Just to see, as she did daily. 

What more eggs were with the two. 



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LOVE POEMS 



69 



if 



XVI. 

Pushing through the elm-tree copse, 
Winding up the stream, Ught-hearted, 
Where the osier pathway leads, 
Past the boughs she stoops— and stops. 
Lo, the wild swan had deserted. 
And a rat had gnawed the reeds ! 

XVII. 

Ellie went home sad and slow. 
If she found the lover ever. 

With his red-roan steed of steeds. 
Sooth I know not; but I know 

She could never show him — never, 
That swan's nest among the reeds ! 

— Elizabeth ^arrett frowning 



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Sweet Silence 



J. Haynes Williams 



" IVas my silence wrong or right? " L 'V^^ 

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SELECTION 

A SK not one least word of praise ! 

Words declare your eyes are bright ? 
What then meant that summer day's 
Silence spent in one long gaze ? 
Was my silence wrong or right ? 

Words of praise were all to seek ! 

Face of you and form of you, 
Did they find the praise so weak 
When my lips just touched your cheek — 

Touch which let my soul come through ? 

— Robert frowning 



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SELECTION 
I. 

rjOOD, to forgive ; 
Best, to forget ! 

Living, we fret ; 
Dying, we live. 
Fretless and free. 

Soul, clap thy pinion ! 

Earth have dominion. 

Body, o'er thee ! 

II. 
Wander at will, 

Day after day,^ 

Wander away. 
Wandering still — 
Soul that canst soar ! 

Body may slumber : 

Body shall cumber 
Soul-flight no more. 

III. 

Waft of soul's wing! 
What lies above } 
Sunshine and Love, 

Skyblue and Spring ! 

Body hides — where ? 
Ferns of all feather. 
Mosses and heather. 

Yours be the care ! 



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74 



LOT'S POEMS 



Jf rom dramatic Upricsi 

A WOMAN'S LAST WORD 

I. 

T ET'S contend no more, Love, 

Strive nor w^eep : 
All be as before, Love, 
— Only sleep ! 

II. 

What so wild as words are } 

I and thou 
In debate, as birds are, 

Hawk on bough! 

III. 
See the creature stalking 

While we speak! 
Hush and hide the talking. 

Cheek on cheek! 

IV. 
What so false as truth is. 

False to thee •> 
Where the serpent's tooth is 

Shun the tree — 

V. 
Where the apple reddens 

Never pry — 
Lest we lose our Edens, 

Eve and I. 




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VI. 

Be a god and hold me 

With a charm 1 
Be a man and fold me 

With thine arm ! 

VII. 

Teach me, only teach, Love! 

As I ought 
I will speak thy speech. Love, 

Think thy thought — 

VIII. 

Meet, if thou require it. 

Both demands. 
Laying flesh and spirit 

In thy hands. 

IX. 

That shall be to-morrow 

Not to-night : 
I must bury sorrow 

Out of sight : 

X. 

— Must a little weep. Love, 

(Foolish me!) 
And so fall asleep, Love, 

Loved by thee. 



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Remember Me C. Froschl 

" O the old wall here ! How I could pass 

Life in a long Midsummer day. " 

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77 



Jfrom ^accftiarotto 

PROLOGUE 
I. 
r\ THE old wall here ! How I could pass 

Life in a long Midsummer day, 
My feet confined to a plot of grass, 
My eyes from a wall not once away ! 

II. 
And lush and lithe do the creepers clothe 

Yon wall I watch, with a wealth of green : 
Its bald red bricks draped, nothing loth. 

In lappets of tangle they laugh between. 

III. 
Now, what is it makes pulsate the robe ? 

Why tremble the sprays } What life o'erbrims 
The body, — the house, no eye can probe, — 

Divined as, beneath a robe, the limbs ? 

IV. 

And there again ! But my heart may guess 
Who tripped behind ; and she sang perhaps : 

So, the old wall throbbed, and its life's excess 
Died out and away in the leafy wraps. 

V. 
Wall upon wall are between us : life 

And song should away from heart to heart. 
I — prison-bird, with a ruddy strife 

At breast, and a lip whence storm-notes start — 






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LOVE POEMS 




VI. 
Hold on, hope hard in the subtle thing 

That's spirit : though cloistered fast, soar free ; 
Account as wood, brick, stone, this ring 

Of the rueful neighbors, and — forth to thee! 

— Robert frowning 










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Jfrom Bramatic Uprics; 

ONE WAY OF LOVE 
I. 

A LL June I bound the rose in sheaves. 
Now, rose by rose, I strip the leaves 
And strew them where PauKne may pass. 
She will not turn aside ? Alas ! 
Let them lie. Suppose they die ? 
The chance was they might take her eye. 

11. 

How many a month I strove to suit 
These stubborn fingers to the lute ! 
To-day I venture all I know. 
She will not hear my music? So! 
Break the string ; fold music's wing : 
Suppose Pauline had bade me sing ! 

III. 

My whole life long I learned to love. 

This hour my utmost art I prove 

And speak my passion — heaven or hell? 

She will not give me heaven ? ' T is well ! 

Lose who may — I still can say, 

Those who win heaven, blest are they ! 

— Robert frowning 




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Jfrom Bramatic Uprics; 

GARDEN FANCIES 
I. — The Flower's Name 



X-TERE'S the garden she walked across, 

Arm in my arm, such a short while since : 
Hark, now I push its wicket, the moss 

Hinders the hinges and makes them wince ! 
She must have reached this shrub ere she tumed, 

As back with that murmur the wicket swung ; 
For she laid the poor snail, my chance foot spumed 

To feed and forget it the leaves among. 

II. 
Down this side of the gravel-walk 

She went while her robe's edge brushed the box : 
And here she paused in her gracious talk 

To point me a moth on the milk-white phlox. 
Roses, ranged in valiant row, 

I will never think that she passed you by ! 
She loves you noble roses, 1 know ; 

But yonder, see, where the rock-plants lie ! 

III. 
This flower she stopped at, finger on lip. 

Stooped over, in doubt, as settling its claim 
Till she gave me, with pride to make no slip. 

Its soft meandering Spanish name : 
What a name ! Was it love or praise ? 

Speech half-sleep or song half-awake ? 
I must leam Spanish, one of these days. 

Only for that slow sweet name's sake. 




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IV. 
Roses, if I live and do well, 

I may bring her, one of these days. 
To fix you fast with as fine a spell, 

Fit you each with his Spanish phrase ; 
But do not detain me now; for she lingers 

There, like sunshine over the ground. 
And ever I see her soft white fingers 

Searching after the bud she found. 



Flower, you Spaniard, look that you grow not, 

Stay as you are and be loved for ever ! 
Bud, if I kiss you 'tis that you blow not : 

Mind, the shut pink mouth opens never ! 
For while it pouts, her fingers wresde. 

Twinkling the audacious leaves between, 
Till round they turn and down they nestle — 

Is not the dear mark still to be seen? 

VI. 
Where I find her not, beauties vanish ; 

Whither I follow her, beauties flee : 
Is there no method to tell her in Spanish 

June's twice June since she breathed it with me ? 
Come, bud, show me the least of her traces. 

Treasure my lady's Hghtest footfall! — 
Ah, you may flout and turn up your faces — 

Roses, you are not so fair after all ! 

— Robert frowning 



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LOVE POEMS 



83 






I. 

VOU love all, you say, 

Round, beneath, above me : 
Find me then some way 
Better than to love me, 
Me, too, dearest May ! 



O world-kissing eyes 

Which the blue heavens melt to ; 
I, sad, overwise. 

Loathe the sweet looks dealt to 
All things — men and flies. 



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You love all, you say : 

Therefore, Dear, abate me 
Just your love, I pray ! 

Shut your eyes and hate me — 
Only me — fair May! 

— Elizabeth Barrett frowning 



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85 



Jf rom dramatic Upricsi 

MEETING AT NIGHT 
I. 

'T'HE gray sea and the long black land ; 

And the yellow half-moon large and low ; 
And the startled little waves that leap 
In fiery ringlets from their sleep, 
As I gain the cove with pushing prow. 
And quench its speed i' the slushy sand. 

II. 
Then a mile of warm sea-scented beach ; 
Three fields to cross till a farm appears ; 
A tap at the pane, the quick sharp scratch 
And blue spurt of a lighted match, 
And a voice less loud thro' its joys and fears, 
Than the two hearts beating each to each ! 

— Robert frowning 




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' ' O loaded curls ! release your store 



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IN THREE DAYS 



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I. 
QkO, I shall see her in three days 

And just one night, but nights are short 
TTien t\\'o long hours, and that is mora. 
See how I come, unchanged, unwora ! 
Feel, where my life broke off from thine, 
How fresh the splinters keep and fine, — 
Only a touch and we combine ! 






II. 
Too long, this time of year, the days! 
But nights at least the nights are short. 
As night shows where her one moon is, 
A handVbreadth of pure Kght and bliss, 
So life's night gives my lady birth 
And my eyes hold her ! What is worth 
Hie rest of heaven, the rest of earth ? 



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III. 

O loaded curls ! release your store 
Of warmth and scent, as once before 
Hie tingling hair did, lights and darks 
Out breaking into fairy sparks, 
Wlien under curl and curl I pried 
After the \varmth and scent inside, 
Thro' hghts and darks how manifold — 
Tlie dark inspired, the light controlled ! 
As early Art embrowns the gold. 



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IV. 
What great fear, should one say, " Three days 
"That change the world might change as well 
"Your fortune; and if joy delays, 
"Be happy that no worse befell ! " 
What small fear, if another says, 
"Three days and one short night beside 
"May throw no shadow on your ways; 
"But years must teem with change untried, 
"With chance not easily defied, 
"With an end somewhere undescried." 
No fear! — or, if a fear be bom 
This minute, it dies out in scom. 
Fear ? I shall see her in three days 
And one night, now the nights are short, 
Then just two hours, and that is morn. 

— Tifthert frowning 









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I. 

jr\OST thou love me, my Beloved ? 

Who shall answ^er yes or no ? 
What is proved or disproved 
When my soul inquireth so, 
Dost thou love me, my Beloved ? 

11. 
I have seen thy heart to-day, 

Never open to the crowd. 
While to love me aye and aye 

Was the vow as it was vowed 
By thine eyes of steadfast gray. 

III. 
Now I sit alone, alone — 

And the hot tears break and burn, 
Now, Beloved, thou art gone. 

Doubt and terror have their turn. 
Is it love that I have known. 

IV. 
I have known some bitter things, — 

Anguish, anger, solitude. 
Year by year an evil brings, 

Year by year denies a good ; 
March winds violate my springs. 

V. 
I have known how sickness bends, 

I have known how sorrow breaks, — 
How quick hopes have sudden ends, 

How the heart thinks till it aches 
Of the smile of buried friends. 




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VI. 
Last, I have known thee, my brave 

Noble thinker, lover, doer! 
The best knov^^ledge last I have. 

But thou comest as the thrower 
Of fresh flowers upon a grave. 

VII. 
Count what feelings used to move me ! 

Can this love assort with those ? 
Thou, who art so far above me. 

Wilt thou stoop so, for repose ? 
Is it tiue that thou canst love me ? 

VIII. 
Do not blame me if I doubt thee. 

I can call love by its name 
When thine arm is wrapt about me ; 

But even love seems not the same, 
When I sit alone, without thee. 

IX. 

In thy clear eyes I descried 

Many a proof of love, to-day ; 
But to-night, those unbelied 

Speechful eyes being gone away, 
There's the proof to seek, beside. 

X. 

Dost thou love me, my Beloved ? 

Only thou canst answer yes ! 
And, thou gone, the proof's disproved, 

And the cry rings answerless^ 
Dost thou love me, my Beloved } 

— Elizabeth ^arrett frowning 



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91 



Jfrom Bramatic ilprics; 

ANY WIFE TO ANY HUSBAND 
I. 

V4^Y love, this is the bitterest, that thou — 

Who art all truth, and who dost love me now 

As thine eyes say, as thy voice breaks to say — 
Shouldst love so truly, and couldst love me still 
A whole long life through, had but love its will. 

Would death that leads me from thee brook delay. 

II. 
I have but to be by thee, and thy hand 
Will never let mine go, nor heart withstand 

The beating of my heart to reach its place. 
When shall I look for thee and feel thee gone ? 
When cry for the old comfort and find none ? 

Never, I know ! Thy soul is in thy face. 

III. 
Oh, I should fade — 't is willed so ! Might I save 
Gladly I would, whatever beauty gave 

Joy to thy sense, for that was precious too. 
It is not to be granted. But the soul 
Whence the love comes, all ravage leaves that whole; 

Vainly the flesh fades, soul makes all things new. 

IV. 
It would not be because my eye grew dim 
Thou couldst not find the love there, thanks to Him 

Who never is dishonored in the spark 
He gave us from his fire of fires, and bade 
Remember whence it sprang, nor be afraid 

While that bums on, though all the rest grow dark. 






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V. 
So, how thou wouldst be perfect, white and clean 
Outside as inside, soul and soul's demesne 

Alike, this body given to show it by ! 
Oh, three-parts through the worst of life's abyss, 
What plaudits from the next world after this, 

Couldst thou repeat a stroke and gain the sky ! 

VI. 

And is it not the bitterer to think 

That, disengage our hands and thou wilt sink 

Although thy love was love in very deed ? 
I know that nature ! Pass a festive day, 
Thou dost not throw its relic-flower away 

Nor bid its music's loitering echo speed. 




VII. 
Thou let'st the stranger's glove lie where it fell ; 
If old things remain old things all is well. 

For thou art grateful as becomes man best : 
And hadst thou only heard me play one tune, 
Or viewed me from a window, not so soon 

With thee would such things fade as with the rest. 



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VIII. 
I seem to see! We meet and part; 'tis brief; 
The book I opened keeps a folded leaf, 

The very chair I sat on, breaks the rank; 
That is a portrait of me on the wall — 
TTiree lines, my face comes at so slight a call : 

And for all this, one litde hour to thank ! 






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93 



IX. 
But now, because the hour through years was fixed, 
Because our inmost beings met and mixed. 

Because thou once hast loved me — wilt thou dare 
Say to thy soul and Who may list beside, 
"Therefore she is immortally my bride; 

"Chante cannot change my love, nor time impair. 



"So, what if in the dusk of life that's left, 
"I, a tired traveller of my sun bereft, 

"Look from my path when, mimicking the same, 
"The firefly glimpses past me, come and gone? 
" — Where was it till the sunset ? where anon 

"It will be at the sunrise ? What's to blame ? " 

XL 

Is it so helpful to thee ! Canst thou take 
The mimic up, nor, for the true thing's sake, 

Put gendy by such efforts at a beam ? 
Is the remainder of the way so long. 
Thou need'st the little solace, thou the strong ? 

Watch out thy watch, let weak ones doze and dream ! 

XII. 
— Ah, but the fresher faces! "Is it true," 
Thou'lt ask, "some eyes are beautiful and new? 
"Some hair, — how can one choose but grasp such 
wealth ? 
"And if a man would press his lips to lips 
"Fresh as the wilding hedge-rose-cup there slips 
"The dew-drop out of, must it be by stealth? 



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"It cannot change the love still kept for Her, 
"More than if such a picture I prefer 

"Passing a day with, to a room's bare side: 
"The painted form takes nothing she possessed, 
"Yet, while the Titian's Venus lies at rest, 

"A man looks. Once more, what is there to chide? 

XIV. 
So must I see, from where I sit and watch, 
My own self sell myself, my hand attach 

Its warrant to the very thefts from me — 
Thy singleness of soul that made me proud. 
Thy purity of heart I loved aloud, 

Thy man's-truth I was bold to bid God see ! 

XV. 
Love so, then, if thou wilt ! Give all thou canst 
Away to the new faces — disentranced, 

(Say it and think it) obdurate no more : 
Re-issue looks and words from the old mint. 
Pass them afresh, no matter whose the print 

Image and superscription once they bore ! 

XVI. 
Re-coin thyself and give it them to spend, — 
It all comes to the same thing at the end. 

Since mine thou wast, mine art and mine shalt be. 
Faithful or faithless, sealing up the sum 
Or lavish of my treasure, thou must come 

Back to the heart's place here I keep for thee ! 



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95 



XVII. 
Only, why should it be with stain at all ? 
Why must I, 'twixt the leaves of coronal, 

Put any kiss of pardon on thy brow ? 
Why need the other women know so much. 
And talk together, "Such the look and such 

" The smile he used to love with, then as now ! " 

XVIII. 
Might I die last and show thee ! Should I find 
Such hardship in the few years left behind. 

If free to take and light my lamp, and go 
Into thy tomb, and shut the door and sit. 
Seeing thy face on those four sides of it 

The better that they are so blank, I know ! 

XIX. 
Why, time was what I wanted, to turn o'er 
Within my mind each look, get more and more 

By heart each word, too much to learn at first ; 
And join thee all the fitter for the pause 
'Neath the low doorway's lintel. Tliat were cause 

For lingering, though thou calledst, if I durst ! 



XX. 

And yet thou art the nobler of us two : 
What dare I dream of, that thou canst not do, 

Outstripping my ten small steps with one stride 
I'll say then, here's a trial and a task — 
Is it to bear ? — if easy, I'll not ask : 

Though love fail, I can trust on in thy pride. 




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LOVE POEMS 



XXI. 
Pride? — when those eyes forestall the life behind 
The death I have to go through ! — when I find, 

Now that I want thy help most, all of thee ! 
What did I fear ? Thy love shall hold me fast 
Until the little minute's sleep is past 
And I wake saved. — And yet it will not be! 

— Robert frowning 



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97 






(©uesftion anb ^nsftner 

I. 

T OVE you seek for, presupposes 

Summer heat and sunny glow. 
Tell me, do you find moss-roses 

Budding, blooming in the snow ? 
Snow might kill the rose-tree's root- 
Shake it quickly from your foot. 

Lest it harm you as you go. 



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II. 

From the ivy where it dapples 

A gray ruin, stone by stone, 
Do you look for grapes or apples. 

Or for sad green leaves alone ? 
Pluck the leaves off, two or three — 
Keep them for morality 

When you shall be safe and gone. 

■Elizabeth ^arrett frowning 



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"And still cried the maiden, binding her tresses, 
'Tis only a page that carols unseen! " 



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Jfrom ^ippa S^asi^t^ 

NOON 
PIPPA, singing 

I. 

/TJIVE her but a least excuse to love me ! 
When — where — 

How — can this arm establish her above me, 

If fortune fixed her as my lady there, 

There already, to eternally reprove me } 
("Hist!" — said Kate the Queen; 
But "Oh!" cried the maiden, binding her tresses, 
" 'T is only a page that carols unseen, 
"Crumbling your hounds their messes!") 

II. 
Is she wronged } — To the rescue of her honor, 
My heart ! 

Is she poor ? — What costs it to be styled a donor ? 
Merely an earth to cleave, a sea to part. 
But that fortune should have thrust all this upon her 1 

("Nay, list!" — bade Kate the Queen; 

And still cried the maiden, binding her tresses, 

"'Tis only a page that carols unseen, 

"Fitting your hawks their jesses!") 

— Robert frowning 




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Orpheus axd Eurvdice Sir F. Leighton 

"Hold me but safe again within the bond 
Of one immortal look f ' ' 



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EURYDICE TO ORPHEUS 

A Picture by Leighton 






P^UT give them me, the mouth, the eyes, the brow ! 
Let them once more absorb me ! One look now 
Will lap me round for ever, not to pass 
Out of its light, though darkness lie beyond : 
Hold me but safe again within the bond 
Of one immortal look ! All woe that was, 
Forgotten, and all terror that may be, 
Defied, — no past is mine, no future: look at me ! 

— T^obert frowning 



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" This is but a spray the Bird clung to. 
Malting it blossom with pleasure. " 



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MISCONCEPTIONS 



'T'HIS is a spray the Bird clung to, 

Making it blossom with pleasure, 
Ere the high tree-top she sprung to, 

Fit for her nest and her treasure. 

Oh, what a hope beyond measure 
Was the poor spray's, which the flying feet hung to, — 
So to be singled out, built in, and sung to ! 

II. 
This is a heart the Queen leant on. 

Thrilled in a minute erratic. 
Ere the true bosom she bent on, 
Meet for love's regal dalmatic* 
Oh, what a fancy ecstatic 
Was the poor heart's, ere the wanderer went on — 
Love to be saved for it, proffered to, spent on ! 

— Robert frowning 

*A vestment used by ecclesiastics, and formerly by senators 
and persons of high rank. 



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Teacher and Pupil 



"Look in my eyes! 
Wilt thou change too?" 



OSKAR BeGAS 



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JAMES LEE'S WIFE 
[. — James Lee's Wife Speaks at the Wixdow 

I. 

A H, Love, but a day 

And the world has changed ! 
The sun's away, 

And the bird estranged ; 
Tlie wind has dropped, 

And the sky's deranged : 
Summer has stopped. 



II. 



Look 



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Wilt thou change too ? 
Should I fear surprise ? 

Shall I find aught new 
In the old and dear. 

In the good and true. 
With the changing year ? 

III. 

Thou art a man. 

But I am thy love. 
For the lake, its swan ; 

For the dell, its dove ; 
And for thee — (oh, haste!) 

Me, to bend above. 

Me, to hold embraced. 

— liobert frowning 






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"So we leave the sweet face fondly there: y^f- 

Be its beauty its sole duty! " 



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LOVE POEMS 



107 









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A PRETTY WOMAN 
I. 

'T'HAT fawn-skin dappled hair of hers, 

And the blue eye 

Dear and dewy, 
And that infantine fresh air of hers ! 



To think men cannot take you, Sweet, 

And enfold you, 

Ay, and hold you, 
And so keep you what they make you. Sweet! 

III. 
You like us for a glance, you know — 

For a word's sake 

Or a sword's sake. 
All's the same, whate'er the chance, you know. 

IV. 
And in turn we make you ours, we say — 

You and youth too. 

Eyes and mouth too. 
All the face composed of flowers, we say. 

V. 
All's our own, to make the most of, Sweet — 

Sing and say for. 

Watch and pray for. 
Keep a secret or go boast of. Sweet ! 





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VI. 



But for loving, why, you would not, Sweet, 

Tliough we prayed you, 

Paid you, brayed you 
In a mortar — for you could not. Sweet ! 



VII. 

So, we leave the sweet face fondly there : 

Be its beauty 

Its sole duty ! 
Let all hope of grace beyond, lie there ! 



VIII. 
And while the face lies quiet there, 

Who shall wonder 

Tliat I ponder 
A conclusion } I will try it there. 

IX. 

As, — why must one, for the love foregone. 

Scout mere liking ? 

Thunder-striking 
Earth, — the heaven, we looked above for, gone I 



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Crush the fly-king 
In his gauze, because no honey-bee ? 



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109 



XI. 
May not liking be so simple-sweet, 

If love grew there 

'T would undo there 
All that breaks the cheek to dimples sweet ? 

XII. 

Is the creature too imperfect, say ? 

Would you mend it 

And so end it ? 
Since not all addition perfects aye ! 

XIII. 

Or is it of its kind, perhaps, 

Just perfection — 

Whence, rejection 
Of a grace not to its mind, perhaps ? 

XIV. 
Shall we burn up, tread that face at once 

Into tinder, 

And so hinder 
Sparks from kindling all the place at once ? 



XV. 
Or else kiss away one's soul on her ? 

Your love-fancies ! 

— A sick man sees 
Truer, when his hot eyes roll on her ! 



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XVI. 
Thus the craftsman thinks to grace the rose, — 

Plucks a mold-flower 

For his gold flower, 
Uses fine things that efface the rose. 

XVII. 
Rosy rubies make its cup more rose. 

Precious metals 

Ape the petals, — 
Last, some old king locks it up, morose ! 

XVIII. 
Then how grace a rose ? I know a way ! 

Leave it, rather. 

Must you gather ? 
Smell, kiss, wear it — at last, throw away! 

— T^obert frowning 



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TIJHAT'S the best thing in the world ? 

June-rose, by May-dew impearled ; 
Sweet south-wind, that means no rain ; 
Truth, not cruel to a friend ; 
Pleasure, not in haste to end; 
Beauty, not self-decked and curled 
Till its pride is over-plain; 
Light, that never makes you wink; 
Memory, that gives no pain ; 
Love, when, so, you're loved again. 
What's the best thing in the world ? 
— Something out of it, I think. 

— Elizabeth ^arrett frowning 







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" You, forsooth, a flower? Nay, my love, a jewel — " 






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PLOWER — I never lancied, jewel — I profess you ! 
Bright I see and soft I feel the outside of a flower. 
Save but glow inside and — jewel, I should guess you, 
Dim to sight and rough to touch: the glory is the dowei 

II. 
You, forsooth, a flower? Nay, my love, a jewel — 

Jewel at no mercy of a moment in your prime ! 
Time may fray the flower-face: kind be time or cruel. 
Jewel, from each facet flash your laugh at time ! 

— I^obert frowning 




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] "Fair Amy of the terraced house. " 






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pAIR .Amy of the terraced house, 

Assist me to discover 
Why you who would not hurt a mouse 
Can torture so your lover. 

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You give your coffee to the cat, 

You stroke the dog for coming, 
And all your face grows kinder at 

The Httle brown bee's humming. 

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But when he haunts your door ... the town 
Marks coming and marks going . . . 

You seem to have stitched your eyelids down 
To that long piece of sewing! 

IV. 

You never give a look, not you, 
Nor drop him a "Good moming, " 

To keep his long day warm and blue, 
So fretted by your scorning. 



She shook her head — "The mouse and bee 

For crumb or flower will hnger : 
TTie dog is happy at my knee. 
The cat purrs at my finger. 



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VI. 



*But he ... to him, the least thing given 
Means great things at a distance ; 

He wants my world, my sun, my heaven, 
Soul, body, whole existence. 



VII. 



'They say love gives as well as takes; 

But I'm a simple maiden,— 
My mother's first smile when she wakes 

I still have smiled and prayed in. 



VIII. 



"I only know my mother's love 

Which gives all and asks nothing ; 
And this new loving sets the groove 
Too much the way of loathing. 



IX. 



'Unless he gives me all in change, 
I forfeit all things by him : 

The risk is terrible and strange — 
I tremble, doubt . . . deny him. 



X. 

'He's sweetest friend or hardest foe, 
Best angel or worst devil ; 

I either hate or . . . love him so, 
I can't be merely civil ! 



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XI. 

*You trust a woman who puts forth 

Her blossoms thick as summer's ? 
You think she dreams what love is worth, 

Who casts it to new-comers? 

XII. 

'Such love's a cowslip-ball to fling, 

A moment's pretty pastime ; 
/ give ... all me, if anything, 

The first time and the last time. 

XIII. 
'Dear neighbor of the trellised house, 

A man should murmur never, 
Though treated worse than dog and mouse. 

Till doated on for ever ! " 

— Elizabeth Barrett frowning 



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"And straight was a path of gold for him, 
And the need of a world of men for me. " 



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Spring Dreams Otto Lingxer 

"Such a blue inner light from her eyelids outbroke. 
You looked at her silence and fancied she spoke. " 



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I. 

CHE was not as pretty as women I know, 

And yet all your best made of sunshine and snow 
Drop to shade, melt to nought in the long-trodden 

ways. 
While she's still remembered on warm and cold days — 

My Kate. 

n. 

Her air had a meaning, her movements a grace ; 
You tumed from the fairest to gaze on her face : 
And when you had once seen her forehead 

and mouth. 
You saw as distinctly her soul and her truth — 

My Kate. 

III. 
Such a blue inner light from her eyelids outbroke. 
You looked at her silence and fancied she spoke : 
When she did, so peculiar yet soft was the tone, 
Tliough the loudest spoke also, you heard her alone — 

My Kate. 

IV. 
I doubt if she said to you much that could act 
As a thought or suggestion : she did not attract 
In the sense of the brilliant or wise : I infer 
'T was her thinking of others made you think of her — 

My Kate. 



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She never found fault with you, never impHed 
Your v^ong by her right ; and yet men at her side 
Grew^ nobler, girls purer, as through the whole towTi 
Hie children were gladder that pulled at her gown — 

My Kate. 

VI. 

None knelt at her feet confessed lovers in thrall ; 
Hiey knelt more to God than they used, — that 

was all : 
If you praised her as charming, some asked what you 

meant. 
But the charm of her presence was felt when she 

went — 

My Kate. 

VII. 
The weak and the gentle, the ribald and rude. 
She took as she found them, and did them all good ; 
It always was so with her — see what you have I 
She has made the grass greener even here . . . 
with her grave — 

My Kate. 

VIII. 

My dear one! — when thou wast alive with the rest, 
I held thee the sweetest and loved thee the best : 
And now thou art dead, shall I not take thy part 
As thy smiles used to do for thyself, my sweet Heart— 

My Kate ? 
— Elizabeth ^arrett frowning 



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123 



Hobeb 0ntt 



I. 




T CLASSED, appraising once, 

Earth's lamentable sounds, — the welladay, 

The jarring yea and nay, 
TTie fall of kisses on unanswering clay, 
TTie sobbed farewell, the welcome moumfuller,— 

But all did leaven the air 
With a less bitter leaven of sure despair 

Than these words — "I loved ONCE." 

11. 

And who saith *T loved ONCE " ? 
Not angels — whose clear eyes, love, love forsee, 

Love, through eternity. 
And by To Love do apprehend To Be. 
Not God, called LOVE, His noble crown- 
name casting, 

A light too broad for blasting: 
The great God, changing not from everlasting, 

Saith never "I loved ONCE." 

III. 

Oh, never is "Loved ONCE" 
Thy word, Thou Victim-Christ, misprized friend ! 

Thy cross and curse may rend, 
But having loved Thou lovest to the end. 
This is man's saying — man's: too weak to move 

One sphered star above, 
Man desecrates the eternal God-word Love 

By his No More, and Once. 



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LOF£ POEMS 




IV. 

How say ye "We loved once," 
Blasphemers ? Is your earth not cold enow, 

Mourners, without that snow? 
Ah friends, and would ye wrong each other so ? 
And could ye say of some whose love is knovm, 

Whose prayers have met your own. 
Whose tears have fallen for you, whose smiles have 
shone 

So long,— "We loved them ONCE"? 



V. 

Could ye "We loved her once" 
Say calm of me, sweet friends, when out of sight ? 

When hearts of better right 
Stand in between me and your happy light ? 
Or when, as flowers kept too long in the shade, 

Ye find my colors fade. 
And all that is not love in me decayed ? 

Such words — Ye loved me ONCE ! 



VI. 

Could ye "We loved her once" 
Say cold of me when further put away 

In earth's sepulchral clay. 
When mute the lips which deprecate to-day ? 
Not so ! not then — least then ! When life is shriven 

And death's full joy is given,— 
Of those who sit and love you up in heaven 

Say not "We loved them once." 



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VII. 

Say never ye loved ONCE: 
God is too near above, the grave beneath, 

And all our moments breathe 
Too quick in mysteries of life and death, 
For such a word. TTie eternities avenge 

Affections light of range. 
There comes no change to justify that change. 

Whatever comes — Loved ONCE ! 



VIII. 
And yet that same word ONCE 
Is humanly acceptive. Kings have said, 

Shaking a discrowTied head, 
"We ruled once," — dotards, "We once taught and 

led," 
Cripples once danced i' the vines, and bards 
approved, 
Were once by scomings moved : 
But love strikes one hour — LOVE ! TTiose 
never loved 
Who dreamed that they loved ONCE. 

— Elizabeth ^arrett frowning 



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" What is she ? Her human self, — no lower word will serve. " 






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POETICS 

"CO say the foolish ! " Say the foolish so, Love ? 
"Flower she is, my rose" — or else "My very 
swan is she" — 
Or perhaps "Yon maid-moon, blessing earth below, 
Love, 
That art thou ! " — ^to them, belike: no such vain 
words from me. 

"Hush, rose, blush! no balm like breath," I chide it: 
"Bend thy neck its best, swan, — hers the whiter 
curve!" 
Be the moon the moon: my Love I place beside it : 
What is she ? Her human self, — no lower word 
will serve. 

— Robert frowning 



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LIBRARY OF CONGRESS 




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